The most outrageous camera phone in recent years just got a global launch

Remember Huawei? Before the infamous Chinese tech giant became famous for alleged threats to national security in the west, it made some of the best camera phones you could buy. Since then, a ban on using Google Services in 2019 has hamstrung Huawei's more recent camera phone offerings, at least for western consumers, but this doesn't seem to have dented the brand's appeal in its Chinese homeland. So much so, that in September last year it launched quite possibly the most audacious camera phone in recent years: the Mate XT Ultimate Design. That September launch was China-only, but now Huawei has just rolled out this incredible phone globally. So what's all the fuss about?

The Mate XT Ultimate Design is the world's first tri-fold camera phone. Where other foldables have two phones sections linked by a single hinge (whether that be to let the screen fold horizontally or vertically) the Mate XT Ultimate Design has three sections and two hinges. Fully unfolded, this gives a tablet-rivalling 10.2" display area with a 3,184 x 2,232 resolution and 16:11 aspect ratio (almost equivalent to the 3:2 ratio of a photo taken on an APS-C or full-frame camera). Alternatively, the device can be used in a 7.9" dual-pane config, and in regular single-pane mode the screen size is 6.4 inches. To achieve a tri-fold design without the phone being thicker than a Tolkien volume when folded away requires some very clever engineering: the Mate XT Ultimate Design is a mere 3.6 thick when fully unfolded (excluding the camera bump). This allows it to be a 12.8mm when folded, which though hardly svelte, is only marginally chunkier than a conventional foldable like the 12.1mm-thick Galaxy Z Fold 6.

As with all foldable phones, the priority is on keeping the device thin, rather than maximising camera quality. As a result, the Mate XT Ultimate Design's camera array is good, but it won't rival the camera abilities of a flagship non-foldable phone like the Galaxy S25 Ultra. Its primary, wide-angle camera uses a 50MP sensor and a variable-aperture f/1.4-f/4.0, 24mm lens. This is teamed with a 12MP, 125mm periscope telephoto module giving 5.5x optical zoom. The final camera in the rear-facing trio is a 12MP, 13mm ultrawide snapper.

Naturally, a phone this outrageous will inevitably have a suitably jaw-dropping price tag: €3,499 (currency conversion: $3,655, £2,895). And you'd better be very careful with it, as Huawei has also published a Chinese price list detailing the cost of replacement parts for the Mate XT Ultimate Design. Expect to pay a cool CNY 7,999 ($1,099, £870) for a replacement screen, while a new logic board costs even more: CNY 9,099 ($1,250, £990).

Still, since when has living life at the bleeding edge ever been cheap?